by Talk To The ArseSo that's what you think 'genuine females' are. Okay...
Yeah, ok. This is indeed boring.
Okay, I have no idea of what the hell is happening here, and I will certainly not bother reading all these pages to change this fact, but I stumbled across this post while searching my name on this forum (lol), and I feel it's my duty to oblige to Xena's request. The problem here is that I've already done this more than once back in psychforums (i.e. explaining how "knowledge" works) and I'm afraid I can't do it without using at the very least 5 paragraphs. Alas! I don't feel like repeating myself, nor exerting my brain too much right now so I'll only share my view on Xena's post, on the link she posted on knowledge and on a little something the user Talk To The Arse said.
So, wooster said:
Yep, there's a difference between 'believing' and 'knowing'.
There is indeed a difference between these words, but only from a narrow perspective. You know a thing if you can prove it is real (i.e. it exists, it is true), while you believe in a thing DESPITE not being able to prove its existence. That's all very well but the problem is that, ultimately, at the highest level, there is no such thing as "knowing", since you cannot prove anything whatever in the world. All that is left, then, is belief and nothing but belief.
Now on to Xena's post:
You prefer knowing. You have not stated explicitly that you know, but we'll assume that this is what you're implying. Observation is a basis for knowledge and you have observed me. Therefore ana's deduction is correct.
Wooster's Epistemology. lololol
Actually, there's nothing wrong with what she said. She's only saying that she has observed you throughout most of your posting history and that she agrees with ana's interpretation of your behavior. Wooster's merely saying ana's deduction is correct, because it matches her own deduction, which she admits was arrived at after careful observation of your 6000+ posts (I can only imagine the boredom, lol). So, basically, wooster's complimenting ana for having understood you with so little observations: Ana BELIEVES you are "so and so", but wooster KNOWS (in the lower, narrow perspective I've outlined above) you are "so and so", because she has 2+ years of data to back herself up and to positively "proof" you being "so and so".
I have no idea what the "so and so" is, and I honestly couldn't care less -- wooster may be spot on in her interpretation or not, I don't give a fuck. If, however, you really wanna know what I think about your personality and about you being "so and so" or not, be prepared to send my way 500€. I will happily do your psychoanalysis afterwards.
This link does not suffice to explain anything whatever about the concept knowledge. It's of an essentially encyclopedic nature, and focuses mostly on the history of the issue and not even of the ENTIRE history, but only on what SOME philosophers had to say about it. It's unbelievable how Nietzsche is not even mentioned there, when he was the one who showed the concepts of "immediate certainty" and "absolute knowledge" were contradictio in adjecto, and that the concept of "thing-in-itself" was meaningless, among a great deal of other things! He basically said all there is to be said about it! But I guess nobody has the time to read him, even after almost two centuries have gone by...
If you people want to understand what knowledge is, you have to read the PHILOSOPHERS, not random encyclopedia or summaries written by clueless philosophy teachers who misinterpret and falsify everything. By reading other people's summaries, you are submitting to THEIR interpretation, which could very well be wrong! So what you must really do, besides having the burning desire to understand these things, is to READ the philosophers themselves. I cannot stress enough how important this is.
That said, I read a bit of it, and it seemed a good summary of the whole knowledge issue. Perhaps it can kick start people into thinking about this stuff.
All-around neat & thorough post, Etzel. Only a little clarification on my side, re this:
after careful observation of your 6000+ posts (I can only imagine the boredom, lol).
Had i read it as one body of text, then it would have been monstrously boring indeed. But, as you know too, posts are dispersed within the (very mixed) context. I'm quite a fast reader (more of a skimmer) when it comes to 'light reading' such as fora.
Nor is it a product of 'careful' observation, just observation - i observe indiscriminately, and then those who grab my attention with valuable input (content / style, or both), I will observe (read) more carefully.
As i said before, it's not rocket science to outline a person's characteristics in a brief time - we're working mostly with the usual clean-cut social stereotypes here. Basic literacy helps too with the taxonomy.
On that note, you're one of the few dark horses. Another one (may i say your crazy flipside) would be Crys. So I usually read your posts.